Release:Biography
Biographies: Nikolaj Coster-Waldau International actor Nikolaj Coster-Waldau is a graduate of the prestigious National Theater School in his native Denmark. After leaving his handprint on the European film and television industry, he made his transition to American cinema. In 2001, Coster-Waldau began his U.S. career with a starring role in Ridley Scott’s critically acclaimed, multi-Academy Award®-winning Black Hawk Down. Next, he landed a lead role in Michael Apted’s Enigma co-starring Kate Winslet, Dougray Scott and Saffron Burrows. Coster-Waldau’s charm and range as an actor have garnered him multiple roles with many of his previous directors. Scott brought Coster-Waldau back for his 2005 epic film Kingdom of Heaven starring Orlando Bloom, Liam Neeson and Eva Green. Additionally, Richard Loncraine, who first cast Coster-Waldau in his 2004 film Wimbledon alongside Paul Bettany and Kirsten Dunst, brought him back for Firewall, a thriller starring Harrison Ford. Coster-Waldau’s additional credits include leading roles in the films Night Watch; Vildspor, which he also co-wrote; Misery; Harbours; Foreign Fields; 24 Hours in the Life of a Woman; Rembrandt; and Manden Bag Dren. David Manson Peabody Award-winning writer/producer David Manson has built a career on developing and producing challenging material. From the controversial drama Nothing Sacred to the powerful Alan Parker film Birdy, from the uncompromising slave drama Nightjohn to the Sting documentary Bring on the Night, Manson’s tastes have been provocative and eclectic. A magna cum laude graduate of the University of California at Irvine, Manson began his career in the theatre and worked as an actor, director or stage manager for such prestigious theatres as the Mark Taper Forum, Playwrights Horizon and the Manhattan Theater Club. He started in the film business working for Dick Berg’s Stonehenge Productions, where he produced his first film, The Spell, when he was only 24 years old. As a senior vice president of Stonehenge, he produced several other movies and miniseries, including the first important television film about the Vietnam War, A Rumor of War, which the New York Times called “unusually ambitious and admirable,” while the Washington Post called it “as true as a movie is going to get.” Manson formed his own company, Sarabande Productions, when he was 28. Since then, he has produced, written or directed a number of critically praised television productions, including co-creating and executive producing the Peabody Award-winning drama Nothing Sacred and such films as Rising Son, which introduced the world to Matt Damon; the highly rated Sessions, starring Veronica Hamel; and Nightjohn, directed by Charles Burnett, which was the recipient of a Special Citation Award from the National Society of Film Critics and which The New Yorker named the best American movie of the year. Manson was co-creator and executive producer of the FOX series Against the Law and made his directorial debut with Those Secrets, which he also executive-produced. He collaborated with his father, film composer Eddy Manson, on the Christopher Award-winning Eye on the Sparrow and Love Affair: The Eleanor and Lou Gehrig Story. In features, he executive-produced Birdy, starring Matthew Modine and Nicolas Cage, which garnered the Special Jury Prize at the Cannes Film Festival. He then produced Bring on the Night, directed by Michael Apted, starring Sting, which claimed a Grammy Award® for best long form video. His other credits include The Cemetery Club, starring Ellen Burstyn and Danny Aiello, and the Drew Barrymore-Chris O’Donnell film Mad Love. Manson has executive-produced several films with his wife, writer-producer Arla Sorkin Manson, including the highly rated telefilm The Wedding Dress. He also executive-produced two films, Thicker Than Blood, based on Bill Cain’s award-winning play, Stand-Up Tragedy and Manson’s WGA Award-nominated adaptation of Baby, which starred Farrah Fawcett and Keith Carradine. On the pilot front, Manson wrote Uncivil Wars. More recently, Manson has served as a consulting producer on the provocative cable series Big Love; executive-produced and written several episodes of Thief starring Andre Braugher; and created and executive-produced the series Saved. Alexie Gilmore Alexie Gilmore appears as the lead opposite Matthew McConaughey in Surfer Dude, produced by Tom Hanks’ Playtone shingle. She also can be seen in the films Definitely, Maybe with Ryan Reynolds and Rachel Weisz; I Do & I Don’t opposite Jane Lynch; and Erica Dunton’s film Three Words and a Star. Other film credits include The Babysitters with Cynthia Nixon and Descent with Rosario Dawson. On television, Gilmore has guest-starred on Rescue Me, Love Monkey, Law & Order: Criminal Intent, Conviction and Hope & Faith. Her short film Cosa Bella for director Fiona MacKenzie was released on a DVD compilation. Find Love, for which she received rave reviews including Variety’s “Gilmore is magnetic,” also was also released on DVD. Stephen Henderson Stephen McKinley Henderson has worked throughout the United States, on and off Broadway, and in television and film. Among his many honors are the NAACP Theatre Award for Outstanding Dramatic Performance by a Male, the Los Angeles Drama Critics Award and an Obie Award. Henderson made his first Broadway appearance as "Stool Pigeon" in August Wilson’s King Hedley II during the 2001 season. He also played "Slow Drag" in the Broadway revival of Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom with Charles S. Dutton and Whoopi Goldberg; as Van Helsing in Dracula, the Musical on Broadway; and Pontius Pilate in the LAByrinth production of The Last Days of Judas Iscariot, directed by Philip Seymour Hoffman, off-Broadway at the Public Theater. Henderson worked for filmmaker Jim McKay as Arthur in Everyday People. Allan Loeb Allan Loeb’s theatrical film writing credits include Things We Lost in the Fire, Made of Honor and 21. Steven Pearl In 2001, Steven Pearl produced his first feature film, Attraction, starring Tom Everett Scott, Gretchen Mol and Samantha Mathis. Additional producing credits include Lone Star State of Mind from a script discovered on the Internet, and Untraceable. His directing credits include ...At First Sight, a buddy comedy starring Dan Cortese and Jonathan Silverman, and The Substitute 2: School’s Out for cable. Pearl and Allan Loeb were writing partners for several years before teaming as producing partners. Their company, Scarlet Fire Entertainment, has had multiple films in development at Sony, Warner Bros, MGM, Fox Atomic and DreamWorks. Pearl attended Loyola Marymount University’s School of Film and Television, where he co-wrote, directed, produced, co-edited and self-financed the short film The Dog Ate It, which won the Gold Medal at the 18th Annual Student Academy Awards® in 1991, the Directors Guild of America Student Award and several other competitions. Zuleikha Robinson Zuleikha Robinson was born in London and moved to Los Angeles to study at the American Academy of Dramatic Arts. Her first feature was a supporting role in Mike Figgis’ unconventional film, Timecode. In her first lead film role, Robinson played a 19th-century Arabian princess named Jazira opposite Viggo Mortensen and Omar Sharif in the Western epic Hidalgo. She starred as Al Pacino’s daughter in Michael Radford’s film version of Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice alongside Jeremy Irons and Joseph Fiennes. Robinson also appeared in The Namesake opposite Kal Penn. Robinson’s television credits include a series regular role as Yves Adele Harlow (an anagram for Lee Harvey Oswald) in the drama The Lone Gunmen. More recently, she appeared in Rome as Gaia, a slave who comes to the Aventine to work in the tavern of Vorenus and causes trouble in her own right.